Björnskfestivalen 7

Björnskfestivalen 7 was the seventh edition of Björnskfestivalen, the music contest used to select the Björnsk entry for Maia Song Contest 7. The format was confirmed to be returning on 16 January 2017 by the Executive Producer of BTV. The show will take place on 11 February 2017, and it follow the same format as in the last edition, also featuring 10 songs.

For the first time since Björnskfestivalen 1, the participants will consist of 50% male and 50% female lead vocalists. It will also feature at least 20% of the songs in a language other than English - it was confirmed by BTV on 22 January 2017 that one finnish entry and one swedish entry had made the final shortlist.

Format
10 entries will be performed on the night of the Grand Final. They will be voted on by a combination of international juries and a public vote (made up from SMS, televoting, and app votes). When voting closes, the points will be revealed and added together. The contestant with the highest number of points will be declared as the winner and will be selected to represent Björnska in Maia Song Contest 7. This follows the same format as in the previous edition, where the 'Super Final' round was scrapped.

Entry selection
BTV held an open submission for entries to be submitted on 5 January 2016, receiving 2,174 submissions in total - an increase of 198 entries from the previous edition. Entries submitted for the competition were required to be between two and five minutes long, with at least one songwriter holding Björnsk citizenship. The choice of language was free, however due to anti-discrimination legislation and language initiatives, at least one entry selected must be in a language other than English. BTV created a shortlist of entries from the received submissions and formed a selection panel that evaluated the submissions and selected ten entries for the competition.

Presenters
It has been officially confirmed in a BTV press conference that Davina McCall will return to present the series after her successful presenting style in the previous edition. Although widely rumoured that Kim Chi would return to host alongside, this has been denied by executive producers and proven false.

Entries
The artists were announced on 22 January 2017 alongside the composers who had written the entries, and the entries were revealed in full a week later on 29 January. A playlist of all ten songs can be found here.

Final
The final took place in Farsknordi Central Arena, on 9 February 2017, with the winner will be decided by a combination of public televoting and international juries as in previous editions of the show.